opinion: why 'made in canada' is vital for our national blood supply
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as the national blood authority and operator, canadian blood services must ensure canadian hospitals and patients have a safe, secure and sustainable supply of blood and blood products.
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at a time when we as canadians are focused on greater self-reliance — securing essential supply chains, building our own manufacturing capacity and reaffirming our sovereignty — there is one area where increasing self-reliance is vital.
knitted within our healthcare system is a little-known dependency. when someone’s immune system fails, doctors turn to lifesaving immunoglobulins – medicines made from human plasma, the golden fluid that comprises more than half of our blood and carries immune-supporting proteins.
global demand for immunoglobulins is rising fast, and in canada it’s expected to grow by more than 50 per cent over the next five years. this pressure is made more challenging by the fact that today, 70 per cent of the immunoglobulins that canadian patients require are imported, made largely from plasma collected in the u.s. from compensated donors.
one of the enduring lessons of the covid-19 pandemic is that nations that do not produce their own essential products are exposed to risk. this is underscored today with the resurgence of protectionist strategies internationally.
the risk is real. with thousands of canadians critically dependent on immunoglobulins, a disruption to canada’s supply could force doctors to make tough decisions about which patients go without.
canadian blood services has a plan to change this, with your help.
with funding from the federal and provincial/territorial governments, we have opened several new donation centres and will be opening more.
we are collecting more plasma today than ever before, and in order to accelerate at the scale and speed necessary to meet the increasing demand, we have partnered with a global leader in plasma collection and manufacturing. the network of plasma collection centres operated by this partner supplements the plasma collected by canadian blood services. important controls in our agreement ensure their network of centres does not compete with or erode our donor base. they are complementary and additive. this partner has also built canada’s first large scale plasma manufacturing facility, a critical investment into canada’s domestic industrial strategy.
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our plan will establish canada’s first end-to-end domestic supply chain for immunoglobulins, using canadian plasma, manufactured in canada, exclusively for canadian patients. soon, the plasma collected here will no longer cross borders for processing. instead, these lifesaving medicines will be manufactured on canadian soil. this domestic supply chain is both groundbreaking and critical. and it aligns fully with our nation’s objective of reducing reliance on specific trade partners, ensuring resilience to global shocks, and creating a strong canadian industry in biologics drug manufacturing.
the primary purpose of this strategy is to increase self-reliance for immunoglobulin medicines, but as plasma collection and manufacturing increases, there are byproducts from the manufacturing process that can be used to produce another critical medicine, albumin. there has been confusion about this aspect of our work, so let me be clear: canada’s needs for albumin are currently met thanks to the generosity of canadian donors. instead of discarding these precious biological byproducts, our partner manufactures and directs their albumin to patients in other countries. this ensures scarce biological resources are not wasted.
this plan to strengthen resilience within our borders was informed by patients, clinicians, industry and market analysts, health economists, specialists in ethics and law, as well as other blood operators.
and it is already working. domestic immunoglobulin sufficiency has increased from 15 per cent in 2022 to 30 per cent this year.
as the national blood authority and operator, canadian blood services must ensure canadian hospitals and patients have a safe, secure and sustainable supply of blood and blood products. this is a public trust we take seriously.
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to deliver on this commitment, we rely on thousands of donors who give selflessly to help people they will never meet. canadians take great pride in this kind of service, 71 per cent see donating blood or plasma as a meaningful way to give back, and nearly half view it as a canadian expression of generosity.
yet a disconnect persists: while one in two canadians is eligible to donate, only one in 76 does.
that gap is putting real pressure on our health systems as our population ages and use of plasma-derived therapies expands.
donation is a quiet act of civic solidarity—patriotism in practice. it ensures hospitals have what they need to deliver lifesaving care. the need is urgent—for patients today and for the future of our health systems. strengthening canada’s plasma supply is a national priority, and our plan is already underway. every donation secures our supply.
dr. graham d. sher is the ceo of canadian blood services.
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